Chapter 113: Princess Gyeongseon (1)
Princess Gyeongseon shouted in surprise at the sudden scream coming from outside.
“What’s going on!”
“Your Highness, you must flee!”
A maid and a guard rushed in as they shouted.
“You must flee. Assassins have come!”
Princess Gyeongseon ran toward the back door with the three escorts who had been waiting outside. She truly ran with all her might.
But before long, the assassins had caught up, and one of the escorts said,
“We’ll hold them off here, so take Her Highness and go!”
The maid and the guard resumed running with Princess Gyeongseon.
From the continuous screams that followed not long after, it seemed the escorts had been quickly overwhelmed.
Because the guards assigned from the imperial palace were more for surveillance, the King of Namcheon had selected his personal guards himself for his close protection.
That’s why, in fact, the King of Namcheon’s guards were weaker than those of Yong Biyang.
The assassins soon caught up and charged toward Princess Gyeongseon.
“I’ll block them. Your Highness must escape this place. You’ll only be safe if you go to His Majesty.”
He judged that the many martial artists gathered there would provide security.
They were now racing toward that place.
Hearing screams behind her made her chest ache, but she didn’t stop.
However, no matter how much a woman with no knowledge of martial arts ran, she couldn’t possibly outrun those trained in it.
Shiiing!
Five masked assassins in black blocked her path. Turning around, she saw five more slowly approaching from behind.
It was then that Princess Gyeongseon realized she was going to die.
But even in death, she wanted to maintain her dignity.
“Who are you to dare shed blood in this princess’s quarters! Do you even know who I am!”
At her commanding outburst, the frightened young maid snapped back to her senses.
One of the masked men replied.
“We have no intention of killing Your Highness. However, we can’t let you go unscathed.”
“If you intend to disgrace me, then kill me instead!”
Even when facing death, Princess Gyeongseon shouted boldly at the masked man.
“So you really are Princess Gyeongseon.”
The masked man let out a low exclamation.
Though the King of Namcheon had no sons, it was said he had a daughter whom he prized more than having two sons.
That daughter was Princess Gyeongseon.
She might have seemed weak from her heavy focus on literature, but she was so bold that people called her a heroine.
Because of that, the King of Namcheon had considered teaching her martial arts, but she had refused.
As the masked man stepped toward her, the maid threw herself in front of Princess Gyeongseon and shouted.
“You cannot lay a hand on Her Highness!”
Shuk!
With the sound of a blade, the maid’s body flinched once before collapsing to the ground.
Thud!
“W-woo Yi!”
The one who had shared the longest bond with Princess Gyeongseon in the royal household was none other than the maid Woo Yi.
She was so slow-witted that the name ‘Woo Yi’—as in “reading to a cow”—had been given to her, but she had a pure heart and cherished the princess more than her own life.
When the child she had raised since youth died trying to protect her, Princess Gyeongseon couldn’t hold back her rage and tears flowed.
She didn’t understand why her tears came from anger.
‘If only… if only I had strength…’
In that moment, images of the female warriors she had recently seen among the younger generation of the Mount Hua Sect flashed through her mind.
‘If I had known martial arts like them, Woo Yi wouldn’t have died. And I wouldn’t be facing this humiliation either.’
For the first time, Princess Gyeongseon regretted not learning martial arts.
Wiping the tears from her eyes, she said,
“You should just kill me. If not, you’ll be hunted by me until the day you die.”
The masked man, for a brief moment, looked into her calm gaze and realized her words weren’t an empty threat.
But perhaps the order from above was too absolute, because the masked man approached Princess Gyeongseon.
“Please close your eyes.”
Even so, since she was the princess of a vassal kingdom, the masked man still offered some respect.
It showed that they weren’t complete savages.
Princess Gyeongseon closed her eyes.
The reason the masked man had asked her to close her eyes was so he could gouge them out.
As he reached to jab his fingers into her eyes, someone suddenly appeared and twisted his fingers.
It was Yong Hwarin.
Crunch!
The two fingers snapped like dry twigs, and the nearby masked men stabbed toward Yong Hwarin’s side with their swords.
This time, Yong Hwarin grabbed the man’s broken hand and yanked him forward.
Having infused his internal energy when he snapped the fingers, the assassin couldn’t move a single joint.
As the man was dragged toward him, the others stopped attacking Yong Hwarin and instead thrust their swords at Princess Gyeongseon.
Yong Hwarin hadn’t expected them to abandon their comrade and attack the princess instead.
He hurled the masked man in his grip at the two attackers and grabbed Princess Gyeongseon’s waist, pulling her backward.
Princess Gyeongseon slightly opened her eyes at the sensation of being lifted into the air with someone’s arm wrapped around her waist.
She caught a side view of the man holding her. Her heart trembled at the unfamiliar scent of a man she had never experienced before. She had never imagined she could feel something like this in a life-or-death moment.
Even she was confused by her reaction.
Up until now, she had never once thought about men nor held any interest in them.
Partly because she was still young, but also because of her distaste for the crudeness and simplicity of men, she had even harbored something akin to disgust toward them.
That was also why she had come to dislike martial arts. Her dislike for men had extended to warriors and martial arts itself.
But the man’s next words quickly froze her fluttering heart.
“These sons of bitches! What kind of dogshit nonsense is this!”
Upon hearing that, Princess Gyeongseon thought to herself,
‘He must really like dogs.’
Yong Hwarin couldn’t even imagine what would’ve happened if she had been injured.
He had managed to rescue her, but the curse—his favorite from his past life—had burst out on its own.
While running his merchant union, Yong Hwarin used to swear like this at people he didn’t like.
Yong Hwarin especially favored curses that started with "dog."
Until now, he had restrained himself from swearing, having resolved to live more seriously in this second life.
“You lot… you never intended to make it back alive, did you?”
“Attack!”
Despite Yong Hwarin’s curse, the masked men didn’t respond and lunged at him.
As four masked attackers rushed from all directions, Yong Hwarin spoke to Princess Gyeongseon.
“Please excuse me.”
He wrapped an arm around her waist and stomped forward.
Their bodies glided smoothly ahead.
In the next instant, Yong Hwarin shot forward and swept through the enemy with the Soaring Dragon Emperor Sword.
As he attacked with Dragon Claws Guest Mountain, the masked man backed off, keeping his rear ally in mind and took a defensive posture.
“Not bad!”
Their reaction was that of seasoned experts.
These assassins were already warriors nearing the first-rate level.
It was not easy to face them while carrying Princess Gyeongseon.
Yong Hwarin gently set her down and said,
“Please remain here without moving until I say otherwise.”
Leaving only those words, he shot forward.
As Yong Hwarin darted like lightning, sword qi flowed from his blade.
“Be careful!”
A masked man shouted from the rear, but it was already too late.
Yong Hwarin unleashed his sword art without reservation.
With Will Bends Like Heaven’s Mandate, he pierced one assassin’s chest and turned around.
At that moment, the masked attackers realized they were no match for him and turned their weapons toward Princess Gyeongseon.
From behind her, one assassin flew in and swung his blade at her arm when Yong Hwarin shouted,
“Spread your legs!”
Princess Gyeongseon followed his command and spread her legs.
Yong Hwarin slipped through the gap between them like the wind.
It was the ultimate technique called Thunder Dragon Like an Arrow.
Unleashing it in tandem with Cloud Step Ascending Dragon Art, Yong Hwarin’s body shot across the ground like a low-flying arrow.
Slash!
His blade severed the throat of one masked man.
The two on either side lunged for Princess Gyeongseon’s flank.
Yong Hwarin, using Cloud Step Ascending Dragon Art again, soared toward her.
Just as the blades were about to strike her, he grabbed her waist with both hands and flung her skyward.
“Oh my!”
Two swords stabbed the spot where she had just been.
Had she remained there, they would’ve pierced straight through her sides.
With a hair’s breadth to spare, Yong Hwarin threw her upward and, using the technique Returning Dragon Circles the Sky, slashed down the two masked men.
Focused solely on attacking Princess Gyeongseon, they were caught off guard and beheaded on the spot.
At that moment, another masked man who had been hiding in a tree leapt up and hurled throwing knives at the airborne Princess Gyeongseon.
Six daggers flashed toward her.
“Persistent bastards!”
He hadn’t expected any of the assassins to be hiding in the trees.
‘I’ve still got a long way to go. I didn’t even notice that!’
He scolded himself inwardly, but there was no time to rest.
He leapt skyward.
Thud!
Kicking off the ground with both feet, Yong Hwarin’s body shot straight into the air.
Just as the daggers were about to hit Princess Gyeongseon, he reached out and grabbed her ankle, pulling her downward.
As her body, which had been ascending, suddenly plunged downward, Princess Gyeongseon couldn’t even scream—she just opened her mouth.
Swish!
Five of the daggers tore through the space where she had just been.
But one of them, aimed at her lower body, buried itself in her abdomen.
Thunk!
Yong Hwarin froze at the sound.
If anything happened to Princess Gyeongseon, he couldn’t predict how the King of Namcheon would react.
Still holding her in his arms, Yong Hwarin descended and hurled his sword at the fleeing assassin.
Though it seemed like a random throw, it contained the mystery of the Gale-Blown Flying Sword technique.
The sword pierced the fleeing assassin’s back.
The blade shot through the Life Gate Point and came out through his navel, dropping the man flat on the ground.
He had used internal energy to pierce the pressure point, ensuring the assassin couldn’t escape.
Princess Gyeongseon, watching the masked men being eliminated in less than two hours, looked at Yong Hwarin with a complex gaze.
To her, his casual slaughter made him seem like some kind of monster.
And yet, seeing Yong Hwarin trembling, she felt a twinge of sympathy.
But this was her misunderstanding.
He wasn’t trembling from guilt over the killing.
It was tension. His body trembled at the thought of the dagger that had struck her abdomen.
“Princess Gyeongseon, are you all right?”
Yong Hwarin looked down at her abdomen.
A dagger was lodged there, trembling slightly.
Princess Gyeongseon also looked down at it and, with a trembling hand, grabbed the hilt.
“Please don’t pull it out!”
But the dagger had no blood on it whatsoever.
Yong Hwarin’s eyes widened in shock.
Princess Gyeongseon, seeing his startled face, couldn’t help but laugh despite her own trembling.
It was an amusing sight to see someone so brave and fierce caught completely off guard.
Princess Gyeongseon reached into her robes and pulled something out.
“It’s a poetry book.”